Andrew Linham

News and Gigs

Welcome to 2021

Last year was a challenging year and this year seems to already be following a similar path, but there's still lots of exciting things happening. I've been expanding the LyricLand platform working with Ardleigh Green Learning Federation, adding a variety of musical games, songs, listening projects and rhythmic workshops in an ever increasing number of videos that are keeping the students engaged with music making in the midst of this global pandemic. I've also been developing a series of 'Not-So-Nursery Rhyme' videos which unpack the traditional songs of childhood in a more interesting way. Also, I recently wrote an article for Teach Primary Magazine on how the school has approached taking the music curriculum online and the various ways the school has found to keep singing on the agenda, which has been an incredible journey to both lead and explore with the School.

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I'm still working with the
Queens' Theatre Hornchurch on our youth theatre musical 'Never Never' which is currently scheduled to be performed in July 2021. I'm quietly optimistic that this work will see the light of day this year, but one never knows. I can't wait to share the rich score full of 1950's and 60's pastiche across the whole gamut of the pop music of that era. One of my highlights of last year was getting the show band together to explore the orchestration I spent most of the summer writing to see quite how close we could get the orchestration mirroring the sounds of the explosion of pop music we saw in post war England.

Live-streaming continues to be a major part of my output for both the Queens' Theatre and Ardleigh Green Learning Federation and I've been slowly upping my technological game which has been an exciting learning process too. We even did a livestream singalong on Christmas Day, which was such fun! Much of this work has been funded by
Clarion Futures and The Paul Hamlyn Foundation so a big thank you to them for assisting the creation of 'Andrew Linham's Tea Time Treat' as it was amusingly titled! On various Thursdays I'm live at 11am with QTH and regularly on Fridays (term time!) at 11:30 with Ardleigh Green, which adds some flavour to the week! My Havering Music School work has been continuing too.



In March my rescheduled work with the
Royal Ballet School is set to take place which is a job I adore, it's such fun to creatively work with a ballet teacher in improvising musical accompaniment for the dancing. The Primary Steps Programme is really important outreach work to get communities who otherwise would not have access to ballet training involved in dancing, which is a great way to spend time in lockdown. I myself regularly make time to jump around the room and it still amazes me how much it improves my mental health!

I've been writing lots of original songs during this third UK Lockdown, one of which is being used by Local Girl Productions in Essex, an incredible community theatre group that explore the untold stories of Essex women. I hope that soon I can share the new song with you, as it is one that I am particularly fond of for reasons that, when you hear it, will become very clear! I'm forever restless and always wanting to write something during this lockdown so have been spending a lot of time trying to set famous poems to music which has been an enjoyable distraction from the world at large… whether they will be of any use in the future I've no idea, but it is fun to set small and achievable goals in these continually uncertain times.

I'm hoping that soon I can announce some actual performances of various descriptions as there are a few dates tucked away in the diary, but for now, stay safe and stay sane!

Andrew